I know what you’re thinking: did we really need a sequel to Freaky Friday? The original 2003 film starring Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan was a fun, family-friendly romp, but it wasn’t exactly begging for a sequel, let alone one nearly 20 years later. More importantly, the central conceit is so fantastical; how exactly are they going to do it again without it feeling forced? That’s the challenge for director Nisha Ganatra (Late Night, Transparent), and writers Jordan Weiss (Dollface) and Elyse Hollander; a challenge they thankfully manage to overcome, though not without some bumps along the way.

It’s been over 20 years since Anna Coleman (Lindsay Lohan) and Tess Coleman (Jamie Lee Curtis) swapped bodies for a day, and discovered the challenges each other face in their daily lives. However, they now face a whole new set of challenges. For Anna, it’s raising her own teenage daughter Harper (Julia Butters) as a single mother. For Tess, it’s navigating how best to support her daughter while also meeting her granddaughter’s needs (and being a podcaster on the side, because it’s 2025, after all, and everyone has a podcast). But the family’s life is turned upside down when Anna meets Eric Davies (Manny Jancito), a famed English chef with a teenage daughter of his own. They quickly fall madly in love and decide to marry. This would seemingly be a wonderful event, were it not for the fact that Harper does not get along with Eric’s daughter Lily (Sophia Hammons) at all. On top of all that, Anna and Eric are weighing whether or not they should relocate their family to London, something both Harper and Tess are vehemently against. This is the backdrop to the conflict heading into Anna’s bachelorette party, where the four women will meet Madame Jen (Vanessa Bayer) who will truly turn their lives upside down, and inside out.

If that seems like a complicated setup for a rehash of the same basic conceit as the 2003 film, that’s because it is. The first act is, admittedly, somewhat of a slog. 30 minutes are spent trying to set-up the conflict, re-establish the characters from the first film, as well as introduce the new characters into the mix, but it all feels very forced and tired. Shortcuts are taken, which means relying on tired tropes that make the whole thing that much more awkward. It’s also where the jokes fall flat – the bulk of the comedy comes from tired “look how different Gen Z is from Millennials” and “oh man, Boomers parented so differently from Millennials” observations and I was genuinely worried what I had gotten myself into.

Mercifully, the second Vanessa Bayer (Trainwreck, Office Christmas Party) arrives on screen, the laughs start flowing. She quite literally steals the show for the next 10 minutes, and thankfully once the “freaky-ing” starts happening the film completely comes to life. By the end, I was completely won over; the jokes were landing, I wasn’t questioning the conceit (in fact, in some ways I felt it worked better than the first time around), and perhaps most importantly, the more Disney-esque heartfelt moments felt entirely earned in a way that they never really did back in 2003. Does some of the character development feel under cooked? Yes; I’m not sure Lily’s arc is as developed as it should be, and her denouement feels a little rushed and un-earned. However, I was willing to look past that and found myself absolutely grinning ear-to-ear by the time the credits rolled.

Of course, the whole film hinges on our central cast. Curtis is, essentially, reprising her performance from the 2003 film, though this time elevated by the fact she’s aged 20 years; and the film milks it for all it’s worth. Instead of a 45-year-old playing a teen, we now have a 66-year-old, dressed in modern day fashion and using teenage slang. Honestly, it could have been “totally cringe”, and yet she has absolutely no trouble milking it for laughs. Sometimes her performance can feel a little over the top, but considering we’re watching a body-swap comedy, there’s nothing wrong with a performance being a little broad.

Having said that, it’s Lohan’s performance that is all the more fascinating this go around. Last time she was expected to embody the mannerisms of a 45-year-old Jamie Lee Curtis. Now, instead she’s essentially playing the age she was during the release of the original film. And she does so effortlessly. There are moments throughout the film where you genuinely forget that she’s no longer a teenager, she is able to so perfectly emulate that energy she had 20 years prior. It’s a reminder of the sheer level of talent Lohan once had, and clearly still has, but has been unable to harness in the last decade.

It’s honestly kind of a shame that Curtis is given all the biggest comedy beats in the film, because the rare times Lohan does get the chance to show off her comedic chops, you are once again are reminded of how funny she can be. The chemistry she has with Curtis is truly electric, which is good, because we’re going to spend most of the film with them, watching them work together as opposed to being at odds like they were in the first film. It’s a nice evolution of the bit. You can tell these two are having fun, and we as an audience in turn have fun with them. If nothing else, it’s just nice to see Lohan acting in a proper film again. I’ve always been a fan of her work, and have lamented the fact that she stopped acting before getting the chance to see her career truly blossom. Hopefully this is just the beginning of a Lohan-aissance.

As for newcomers Butters and Hammons, I was initially unimpressed by their performances as catty teenagers. Perhaps it has more to do with the writing than anything else, but it felt tired, clichéd, and most of all, forced (granted, as a thirtysomething male, perhaps I’m not the best judge of how teenage girls should be portrayed). And yet, when they find themselves transformed into Tess and Anna, they absolutely leapt off the screen. Some of that comes down to visual humour: seeing Hammons dressed up like a teenage-granny is just inherently funny, with her bucket hat and oversize glasses. But more than that, it’s their performances that impressed me.

Butters, like Lohan 20 years prior, fully embodies her inner adult and you genuinely feel like she is a thirty-something mother trapped in her child’s body; you can literally see the way her energy changes. Similarly, Hammons milks the comedy of having a 66-year-old trapped in the body of a teenager. She is able to capture Curtis’ natural charm and charisma. The two have great chemistry playing off of each other, which–much like with Curtis and Lohan–is critical to this whole thing working. But perhaps the best scenes are when the four women are brought together in their swapped forms. Then you really get to see how each actor has managed to capture the mannerisms and energy of their body-swapped counterparts. It’s these moments that remind us what worked the first time around, but more importantly, what continues to work now. It makes this sequel feel earned.

Unfortunately, our side characters are the least interesting, and least developed of the bunch. Manny Jacinto’s comedic chops feel completely underused here, though he does do a pretty great Dirty Dancing impression at one point. Similarly, Maitreyi Ramakrishnan’s feels a bit underused as Anna’s pop-superstar client Ella. She pops in and out, never really getting the chance to truly shine (though it’s nice to get to see her on the big screen). Chad Michael Murray’s return as Jake also falls flatter than expected – it’s one of the few moments in the film that feels like it’s simply trying to cash in on the nostalgia factor rather than actually being motivated by the plot’s needs. Speaking of nostalgia, there’s also an all-too-brief cameo from Elaine Hendrix that left me jonesing for a Parent Trap sequel (and her casting was clearly meant to be a nod to said film). Finally, while Mark Harmon is certainly around, he has so little to do you almost wonder why they even bothered.

I was also struck by the overall visual language of the film. The 2003 film is shot like a relatively pedestrian 2000-era comedy. It looks perfectly fine but there’s no visual flare to be found. Freakier Friday on the other hand absolutely tries to level things up. The “transformation” sequences in particular have a visual flourish that I wasn’t expecting from a Disney family comedy. Matthew Clark’s cinematography really elevates the final product and, coupled with with Ganatra’s confident direction, the end result is a film that feels like a proper theatrical movie, as opposed to some sort of direct-to-streaming cash-in.

Despite a dodgy first act, Freakier Friday absolutely won me over by the end thanks to its commanding lead performances from Jamie Lee Curtis, Lindsay Lohan, Julia Butters, and Sophia Hammons. This film has lots of laughs and lots of heart, and some fun surprises for those of us who saw the original in theatres all those years ago. While it will most likely appeal more to the older generation that saw the first film back in 2003, certainly families who watch it together will be able to find lots to enjoy.

Freakier Friday is now playing in theatres across Canada.